Former South African President Nelson Mandela, center, is joined in 2002 at the opening bell by New York Stock Exchange Chairman and CEO Richard Grasso, third from left; Christopher M.T. Thompson, chairman and CEO of Gold Fields Ltd., second from right; and Ian Cockerill, managing director and COO of Gold Fields, right.

Apartheid in South Africa left a moral dilemma for U.S. and Michigan business, as exporting and importing from a racially segregated nation drew scrutiny throughout the 1980s.

But the 1990 release from prison of Nelson Mandela, who died Thursday at the age of 95, marked the beginning of the end of apartheid and the start of increased trade to the new unified nation from Michigan and the U.S.

Despite political pressure, U.S. companies continued to trade with South Africa, with total exports between the two countries totaling $5.8 billion in 1980, according to data from the U.S. Census Bureau. However, apartheid's collapse was shaky and in 1994, the same year Mandela was elected president of South Africa, trade dropped to $4.2 billion.

Michigan exports to South Africa were $24 million in 1989, according to a 1991 article by The Associated Press. By 1991, the state's global expansion efforts aligned with the official repeal of apartheid and the Michigan International Office targeted South Africa for trade growth, according to the article.

BLOOMBERG

Nelson Mandela's release from prison in 1990 marked the start of increased trade to South Africa from Michigan and the U.S.

The push was further triggered by Mandela's 1990 visit to Detroit, when he toured the city and visited the FordMotor Co. River Rouge Plant.

Michigan's exports to South Africa totaled $212.7 million in 2012, up from $60.2 million in 2002, according to Census Bureau data.

Michigan's export growth from 1989 to 2012 represented an increase of more than 786 percent, compared to a 347 percent increase for the total U.S. during the same time frame. Total U.S. exports to South Africa grew to $7.6 billion in 2012.

The state far outpaced the rest of the U.S. in exports to South Africa, thanks to that country's growing need for automobiles. Automobile and parts exports from Michigan to South Africa have grown significantly since the end of apartheid to $110.2 million in 2012, or nearly 52 percent of all of Michigan's exports to the country.

John Taylor, chairman of the department of marketing and supply chain management at Wayne State University, said the end of apartheid led to a stable political and economic climate for South Africa, opening its borders for more trade.

"The end of apartheid provided for a much more stable economic environment in South Africa and opened up the ability for companies to take advantage of the local labor force and raw materials ... ," Taylor said. "The stability allowed for markets to grow in South Africa and led to an increase of both finished goods and components."

Michigan's second-largest export to South Africa is machinery for its own mining, agricultural and automotive industries, totaling $41.5 million in 2012, up from $8.4 million in 2002.

Conversely, Michigan imported $112.5 million worth of machinery from South Africa in 2012, accounting for 69 percent of the $162.8 million worth of South African imports to the state.

However, the road to a better trading partner was not easy for Michigan.

In 1982, then-Michigan Gov. William G. Milliken pushed for legislation to ban public pension funds and state universities from investing in companies that did business in South Africa. It became Michigan law later that year. Milliken and the state Legislature did not attempt to ban where private companies did business.

Michigan State University and Eastern Michigan University, as well as others, ended investments tied to the country prior to the ban, but the University of Michigan declined to and sued the state over the issue.

UM held more than $50 million of stock in companies doing business in South Africa, later reducing its stake to $500,000 worth, which it maintained for the lawsuit, according to a 1988 AP article. In 1989, the Michigan Court of Appeals ruled the ban violated UM's autonomy, which is protected in the state constitution.

Then-state Rep. Morris Hood, chairman of the House Appropriations Subcommittee on Higher Education, called the ruling a setback for the civil rights movement.

"I think it sends a message to those institutions and those businesses that the people of this state are really not concerned with equal rights," Hood told the Associated Press.

However, representatives from the university told the AP the lawsuit was about protecting its authority to govern itself, not civil rights.

South Africa is now a training ground for legal studies for the university, which has sent more than 100 third-year law students as part of its externship program since 1996.